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16th INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON HIGHER EDUCATION REFORM (HER2019)

Digital Society and Higher Education: Impact and Consequences for Policy

Hosted by Department of Educational Studies at Centre for Research and Advanced Studies,

Mexico City, September 11-13, 2019

Call for proposals

The transition to the digital society leads to immense change in the economic, social and cultural life of nations. It is a transition with profound consequences for higher education: its institutions (HEIs) and systems, their administration, forms of teaching and learning, research priorities and methodologies, assessment of quality and impact across and within the higher education system (HES), and the ethical questions raised by and in a ‘digital society’.

Cloud computing, the internet of things, ‘big data’, data openness and analytics, driven by information and communication technologies and artificial intelligence, imply important changes in research, teaching, and external linkages. Examples include online learning, research using drawing on data analytics, working through network consortia, increased collaboration with external partners (professional associations, industry, communities and international organizations).

Not all the new rules and ways of academic life will be determined by public policy. Some will fall within the purview of autonomous HE institutions and be constrained by the freedom of academics to define their research and teaching responsibilities. In light of the power of major global corporations and commercial interests, the boundaries between public and private in digitalized higher education may be further blurred.

Still, government, HEIs, industry and commerce, the liberal and new professions, nonprofit organizations, and the wider public—all have wider interests in higher education as an engine of scientific progress. We are obliged to consider how digital society and digitalized HEIs contribute to sustainable development and social justice between richer and poorer countries.

Key issues and topics

With the focus on public and institutional policies and reforms, the theme invites a multi-disciplinary perspective (theoretical and empirical), including, for example, topics such as:

·New ways to disseminate research, e.g. open access (MOOCs), the end of traditional academic journals and monographs, the role of intellectual capital and its distribution and protection in collective research and teaching.

·Consequences of the changing knowledge production on evaluation systems and academic careers, e.g. ‘impact’ factors and other tools of scientific metrics.

·Public and institutional policies for the use of information and communication technologies in face-to-face learning and online open programs.

·Governance in the digital HEIs: the place(s) of senates, departments, faculty unions, community interest groups, government and leadership.

·Policies to prevent, monitor and sanction plagiarism, forged data and other a dishonest academic behavior.

Workshop Organization

The 16th conference will be held in Mexico City, under the auspices of Centre of Research and Advanced Studies (www.cinvestav.mx), an academic institution of great prestige and leadership in Latin America and many other countries, in various areas of natural and exact sciences, technologies and social sciences (especially in education).

The Mexico City conference is the 16th in an international series of conferences on Higher Education Reform, which have taken place annually since 2003. The first in this series was held in Vancouver, Canada, organised by the Centre for Policy Studies in Higher Education and Training at The University of British Columbia. In following years conferences took place in Tokyo, Vienna, Shanghai, Mexico City, Vancouver, Berlin, Pittsburgh, Ljubljana, St. John’s, Tianjin, Dublin, Hiroshima and Baltimore.

Call for proposals

The 16th International Conference (HER2019) encourages comparative analysis and discussion emphasizing policy and reform in/of postsecondary education. The conference will support an open exchange of views in a collegial environment, based on empirical research and policy analysis. As with previous conferences, a selection of papers and panel presentations will be published after the conference.

If you require further information in the meantime, please feel free to email us at the above-mentioned e-mail address.

The 2019 HER will take place at the Department of Educational Research, Center for Research and Advanced Studies, Calzada de los Tenorios 235, Granjas Coapa, Tlalpan, 14330, CDMX. Mexico. Information about access to the venue can be consulted at: https://goo.gl/maps/MhJW6RKi5ER2. More details will be available on the 2019HER website.

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